It does boost their shots. Roided digi missiles do 12 mil damage from what Iāve seen. It also boosts Optimism novas.
You are right about the RNG though. If Eclipse spawns in the wrong spot, the fight is instantly extended by a good 2 minutes. Still, being able to wreck Eclipse in a minute is still worth all the times he takes 3 or 4 minutes to me.
WARNING: Long post ahead.
So I was thinking about what you said about staying away from the Hero COMs to make a good pet build, and I was looking through Jackās COMs too see which ones would be the best options to explore outside of the VIP/ Protagonist, and I got an idea.
Pure pet builds miss the amount of DPS popping builds can get through infinite ammo and 24/7 kill skill abuse. So, even though pet builds (once the roid shield is done) can get higher burst damage, they canāt sustain that damage long enough to compete with popping builds with regards to damage.
In that case, the question becomes how to make a build that can sustain high DPS without needing kill skill abuse. And the answer lies with the Best Man COM, which also happens to be the COM used for his highest DPS build; tediore chucking.
Tediore chuck builds with Jack function independent of build. While the scav bonus from Sponsored By would no doubt be of great help to chucking, if the bonus from Integrity applies to chucks, that may make up the difference. If not, its a loss for sure, but the inclusion of Resolute could help to close the gap a bit.
The Best Man boosts Just Compensation, which obviously increase your damage with tediore reloads, grenades, and splash damage. However, what makes it a good pet COM is Lean On Me. Not only does it give a personal DPS boost to Jack, but it gives the Jackassesā a 70% chance to do an extra 40% damage that scales with Bolster.
So, you get Lean on Me abuse, which is a DPS up for the Jacks as well, along with metric s**t tons of grenade and splash damage. Best part is, since the only other skill that could improve tediore chucks is Sponsored By, which again does not require digi-Jack murder, you donāt have to worry about missing damage from not popping. If anything, Projection builds might even be detrimental to chucking since AA could proc on the first shot of the mag, making it so you canāt reload.
So, perhaps something like this
or this
would suit your fancy. It would have synergy with grenade spamming, Overload glitch sniping, splash damage weaponry, and of course tediore reloads. It also opens the way for the Eridian Vanquisher to be used, since that COM is also fairly non-dependent on popping. CD is still a little to dependent on popping to work with a pure pet build IMO, but still, this is a pretty good compromise to me.
The Jacks get a pretty consistent 40% damage boost, you get a constant DPS increase, you have tediore chucking for bosses, and any variety of splash damage weaponry for mobbing. Plenty of choices in guns, shields, and grenades, and then there is ammo conservation in the form of the Jacks that kill enemies for you.
You probably tried this already, but still, any thoughts are aprreciated. I donāt really care too much for the original question at this point, becuase you are most definitely right in regards to DPS. There is no way a pet build approaches the DPS of a popping build. In that sense, popping builds are certainly superior to pet builds. However, while the DPS is superior, I still donāt think that the level of tankiness between the two is so far off that popping specs blow pet specs completely out of the water. Iām not quite sure popping Jack is more tanky than Hero Jack, but that may just be a playstyle issue (I personally donāt like teamwork that much).
Still, there are plenty of people out there who do still spec for the pets (although it seems like none of them are on these forums), and hopefully this thread will be of some use for them if they should stumble upon it. Besides, this thread has given me some ideas on different ways to spec my pet Jack so Iād like to keep it going and see what else there is to uncover.
Donāt have time for full analysis but you would want to find some space for a Scav Sponsor somewhere (Although its Really Tricky to accommodate all three trees with a Hero Mindset this is my first take: http://thepresequel.com/Jack/55514100010015050014104101505510000051/thebest,lv70) Im also concerned with how LOM is somewhat wasted in a chuck build bit it can work for mobbing with the IVF used as a gun
Lemme think about it
Ive got 2 jack builds one focuses primarily on jacks dying with nova shields. The damage is good but struggles some in boss fights still doing testing here and there on it.
Just throwing this out there, Badass Jacks do more damage on the optimism nova than non-badasses. Also, optimism novas are boosted by roid damage. Throw on an avalanche and that should take care of any boss that walks pretty handily.
So a melee roid shield adds extra damage upon explosion along with taking the skill that turns them badass? Thats interesting. I may toy around with this here in the near future, thanks for the input 
IIRC, the badass Jacks deal twice as much damage on the optimism nova, so they do about 500k compared to the usual 250k.
Mostly because that line āwe did it folks, we did itā drives me a little nuts. The line is said when a badass jack comes out and itās so weird. Also I donāt like doing things that increase my max health. And that is often connected to that skill tree as well.
Also though I found that I kick so much ass the other way (by making my holoJacks die) that I wonder why I should change it up. I will though. Iāll try it again. It would be neat to completely change up my playstyle and try it.
The max health increase in paltry at best. The highest it goes is +33% when boosted to 11/5. At 5/5, itās the same boost as Man and Machine on Wilhelm. If not for the digi-Jack max health and damage, I would never take it.
Also, the hero tree has so much more than just health. It has a combined total of +60% shield capacity unboosted, increased shield recharge rate and delay, damage resistance, and 2 forms of health regen, both for 10% or more unboosted. In all honesty, Jack may be better at tanking than Wilhelm, and up there with Athena.
He definately Is better than wilhelm (Wilhelmās not very good at anything) I donāt think itās a Hero COM thatāll do it for him (Antagonist with Delegation is really really good at tanking, 50% Damage mitigation)
Iām working on something with the role model right now thats also pretty good. 34% Damage resistance+ the 25% damage redirection from delegation makes you pretty tanky while the Jacks are out, while persistence keeps you covered when theyāre down.
So random thing, but since you brought up the Antagonist, have you tried the Min Min Lighter with it? Its not the most optimal weapon by any means, but the Min Min Lighter+ the Rerouter+ winning= hiliarity. If you group them up with a singularity, you can kill bunches of trash mobs in 1 shot. Its kind of funny.
OP, what exactly do you mean by āpet buildā? The Digi-Jacks are not designed to last, so whether you are mobbing or raiding, the best strategy is to make the clones blow up as often as possible, and shortening their health meters reinforces this strategy. I used to think Wilhelm was tanky, until I utterly facetanked EOS with Jack. Since the minions are the primary threat in that boss fight, I was virtually untouchable while my clones were active, due to them blowing up any minions that dared to come close to me. In fact, the EOS fight is really just a rehashed Warrior fight. In that fight, the Crystalisks are a more serious threat than the Warrior himself.
WARNING: Long post ahead.
Best Foot Forward increases their duration when they kill an enemy, Bolster increases their health so they take longer to die, and Take Their Freedom regens a large percentage of their health when an enemy dies. Between the health returned from TTF and the time given by BBF for killing an enemy, you can extend their duration by as long as 7 or 8 seconds per kill at the beginning of the AS. Those 3 together can keep them out for quite a while, 20+ seconds or more if youāve got a decent sized mob.
Debatable. Stronger clones help you conserve ammo, diverts enemy fire, control choke points and narrow areas, kill enemies you canāt see, etcā¦ There is no ābestā approach to mobbing.
As for raiding: yes it takes longer. But it isnāt overly difficult or impossible. At the end of the day, unless youāre speedrunning or doing time trials, the best build will be whichever one you can use to kill bosses. This has been tested at Eclipse/EOS, the time posted. It takes me 5 minutes to farm Eclipse/EOS with my CEO Jack, and it takes between 6-8 using my pet Jack. At most for me, the difference is 3 minutes, not really a big deal imo. The time it takes isnāt too important, as long as the difference isnāt too great.
I have always done this with both. I may not kill Eclipse/EOS fast with Wilhelm, but he can tank more of EOS BS than any other class Iāve played sans Jack.
You can also refill their meters. Either way works, and I still fail to see how one strategy is intended over the other when GB gave us the skills to do both.
I get why people love Leadership. Its one of the most innovative skills in the borderlands franchise. But its existence does not mean that GB designed Jackās action skill to be used one way.
Jack can tank and do damage regardless of the build he is using. The only difference is the time it takes to do so. Most Jacks can do a constant stream of heavy damage thanks to AA and several fire rate buffs. If we go by the infinity argument from BL2, technically Jack has infinite DPS (theoretically anyway) while AA is active. Pet builds canāt do the same, because unlike Wilhelm, Jack has no skills that increase his petās fire rate. You can increase their damage to stupid amounts (435% is a likely scenario with Bolster at 10/5 and resolute active), but since they have a set fire rate, their DPS ceiling is capped at a certain point.
However, Jackās damage per shot has a lower ceiling than the pets. With their roided melee attacks, they can do 12 million damage, and thatās without Bolster. Thereās a picture in the forums that shows an optimism nova that exploded for 41 million. No matter what the build, no other Jack build is going to reach that kind of single shot damage.
So, I canāt quite accept the ābest strategyā argument. Each approach has its own strengths and weaknesses, and each can be supported with the gear in game. I will concede that projection builds do blow pet builds out of the water in the DPS department because of the lack of fire rate buffs for the Jackās, but in terms of survivability, I canāt see how one is better than the other. They each perform well in their respective contexts. Teamwork, with its constant health regen, works well for popping Jacks because the pets will not be taking most of the shots, you will. So having constant health regen to continually fight through damage is more important for that playstyle. On the other hand, TTF works well in the context of a badass Jack build because enemy fire will mostly be directed towards your Jacks. Youāll receive damage from stray bullets or take during your cooldown, so basically in bursts. Burst heals for burst damage.
Teamwork keeps Jack alive longer, while TTF heals him faster. Neither is inherently superior to the other, it depends on the context in which itās being used.
Hey no need to bash the concept of a pet build here its a valid strategy, albeit the less consistent one because pet builds rely heavily on Jack AI do deal their damage. It might not be my favourite build by any stretch of the imagination (Iām blaming COM design on that part), but If the stars align I actually think the pet build has a better chance at cheating EOS than any popping build could, as bolsters bonuses can get ludicrous if the Jack AI decides to hit the bosses (Iām not joking you can remove huge chunks of HP per shot).
PS Boom u can refute a point without writing a novel.
Sorry, canāt help the novel writing. Its a habit, but I just feel I make my point better when I explain my reasoning as thoroughly as possible.
If its that annoying for everyone though, Iāll try to cut back.
Also, glad to see youāre coming around. [quote=āHoyle4, post:92, topic:505878ā]
its a valid strategy,
[/quote]
Under all those walls of text, this was pretty much all I was trying to say.
Oh, Iām all for extending the duration of the action skill. What I meant was, the health meters of the digi-jacks, not the action skill duration. Combining the digi-jack health diminishing skill with the skills that give them the shock nova and death explosion, means that Jack is most optimal as a close-range pet class, where as Wilhelm can switch between close and long range on the fly. Admittedly, the close-range approach probably becomes a liability in a map like the Holodome, but I havenāt tested this yet.
Thatās what I meant too. With BFF you extend the amount of time a badass Jack is out in general, while TTF extends the amount of time that particular one stays alive.
The actual action skill duration isnāt that important, the critical part is the upkeep of the badass Jacks. Extending the time they are out is the most important thing, and they donāt need to be out for too long.
The potential nova does 500k if I recall correctly. Optimism at 4 or 5/5 does about 250k when a regular Jack dies, 500k if itās a badass (been awhile since I looked, but Iām pretty sure thatās it).
Badass Jacks, right out the gate, do about 200k, but they can increase that 200k with Bolster, Resolute, Collaborate, and Diversify, while Potential canāt be boosted by anything to my knowledge (maybe a shock duality O2 kit?) and the Optimism nova can only be boosted by Roid, cryo, and maybe explosive duality O2 kits, making the circumstances you need to get its max damage kind of annoying to get while mobbing.
So they all do around the same damage (except potential), but the novas have fewer, or far more conditional, methods for increasing their damage, while pet builds just have to stand still, get hit, or move a bit ( though I donāt like this one) to increase their damage.
Jack is way better at tanking than any other borderlands character. At least the way Iām specād. Iām basically invincible when my action skill is up. Athena is still vulnerable from the sides, floor and back and doesnāt regen as much health/shields as Jack can.
Either way, youāve convinced me to try a Jack build based on making badass jacks who last long rather than fast dieing holojacks who die every 2 seconds. So your mission is a success. Iād like to see my jacks do well at some long range attacks on ECLIPSE.